Cats kill billions of small animals a
year, putting animal lovers in afix -- how do you reconcile keeping a
predator as a pet?...There have been two serial killers in my life.
The first was a formerstudent. A couple of years after he graduated from
my university, hemurdered his father, his mother, his younger brother,
and the familydog. After he was arrested, the local television station
sent areporter to interview me because I had been his academic advisor.
Whenthe reporter asked me what he was like, I stupidly looked at the
camera and mumbled the classic cliché:...The same could be said of
the other killer in my life, my cat Tilley.She spends part her days
outdoors, and like most cats, she is arecreational hunter. I am usually
successful in suppressing the guiltthat comes with having a serial
killer for a companion animal, but arecent report in the journal Nature
Communications has caused me torethink the ethics of keeping predators
as pets.

Based on existing data, the researchers concluded that the
havocwreaked by cats on native animal populations has been vastly
underestimated. They calculated that in the US, cats kill between 8bnand
24bn small, feathered, and furry creatures a year, and are thelargest
human-related source of mortality among birds and mammals.While most of
this carnage is caused by free-ranging stray cats, it isnearly certain
that pet cats are responsible for at least 1-2bn ofthese deaths.

Are tabbies in the UK as deadly as their American cousins? Probably. A
2003 study of cats living in 600 British households found that over a
five-month period, the cats brought home the carcasses of over 14,000
small animals. With 10m cats living in British homes, the numbers addup.
...Putting a bounty of feral cats would, of course, be unacceptable to
the millions of us who are cat lovers. An alternative cat reduction
strategy has emerged in recent years – "trap-neuter-return" programs,in
which free-ranging cats are captured, neutered, and set free. Oftenthese
animals live in groups under loose human supervision. As youmight
expect, bird enthusiasts are not happy with the proliferation ofthese
"cat colonies", and indeed, a recent survey found that catcolony
caretakers and bird conservation professionals live indifferent moral
worlds. For example, while 90% of birders agreed thatferal cats
contribute to the decline of native birds, only 20% ofcat-advocates
agreed.

The birders, it seems, are right. "Trap-neuter-return"
programs mayeventually reduce the numbers of free-ranging cats, but they
willprobably take decades to have an appreciable impact. In the
meantime,billions of wild birds and mammals will die and some species
willbecome extinct.

Jesse was faced with the prospects of either
getting rid of herbeloved pets or living in violation of her
convictions. The existenceof millions of feral killing machines in our
alleyways and backyardsposes an equally unpalatable dilemma.